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Did you know that old websites cost companies a lot of money every day? If we accept that every additional second of load speed costs a business 7% of conversions, old websites with old code that is no longer up to date cost businesses a lot of money.

So why invest in moving to a new, or the latest version of your existing, CMS now? After all, the economy is rough and everyone is scared.

We believe that right now, when everyone IS scared, is the best time to redesign and re-platform (or update your platform’s version) your marketing website.

Here’s why.

Some Statistics

There are a lot of websites that operate on old versions of popular CMSs. While this is less of an issue with cloud platforms like Shopify, platforms like Magento or even WordPress that require hosting it yourself have a lot of outdated versions on the web. This is a performance and a security risk!

For example, Magento is a well-known e-commerce CMS that a lot of more established large e-commerce brands still use. They are currently on, according to Magento’s Dev Docs, version 2.4.5.

But when you go to BuiltWith, which is a great tool for researching companies on different technologies, you’ll find that there are many websites on old versions.

For example, there are still 137,489 websites on Magento 1.9, which was released prior to 2015!

When we look at WordPress, whose most current version is 6.0.2, there are still over 2,031,325 websites that are still on WordPress 4.0! Not good!

Here are 4 good reasons why you need to upgrade your website today.

Old Code Costs You Money

There is a commonly quotes statistic that for every additional second of load time your site has, your conversions will drop by 7%. To flip that, for every second you speed up your website you will get an extra 7% conversions on average.

If your site makes $100,000 per month, speeding up your site by a second means you’ll make $107,000 on average every month after that. After a full year, you’ve made an extra $84,000. Wow.

Conversely, if your site makes $100,000 per month and your load time decreases by 1 second, you will now make $93,000 per month or $84,000 less per year. Websites atrophy and load slower over time, so this number will keep increasing.

If you’re looking at a quote for $35,000 for web development work, keep the above numbers in mind.

Pay $35,000 to make an extra $84,000 PER YEAR from there on out, or not pay $35,000 and lose $84,000 per year, every year that you don’t invest in your website?

The choice seems obvious to me.

Agencies Are Hungry For Work

We’re entering lean times. The last few years have been a boom for many companies as people have worked from home, eaten out less, received stimulus money, and generally had more money to spend. There were absolutely many people who were devastated financially during the pandemic, but many had more to spend than before.

That has now changed. People are tightening their belts, as are businesses. Marketing budgets are getting slashed, and agencies are looking for work.

Because of this, you can negotiate harder. You should never ask an agency to work for an unprofitable amount, and they shouldn’t quote you prices that are not profitable for them, but agencies are willing to negotiate more these days on prices because they need the work.

You need a new website, they need the work. I think you can work something out.

Your Competitors Are Scared

As referenced above, businesses are scared right now. Across the board, we are seeing companies slashing marketing budgets and a lot of well-known tech companies have laid of good size percentages of their workforce because they over-hired during the boom days of the pandemic and are now correcting head count for their current size and projected future growth.

In short – they’re scared.

This means your competitors are as well. It also doesn’t mean you are not. Entrepreneur to entrepreneur, I think it’s wise to be aware what is going on around you and adjust course.

But your competitors being scared is also an advantage for you.

They’re hoarding cash. They’re hoping they can survive.

But you’re smarter than they are. You know that you need to invest ahead of the curve. You’ve also been running a smart cashflow positive business and have cash to invest.

Now is the time to invest in your site and even brand identity so you can accelerate out of whatever downturn may come.

Every Conversion Matters

Now more than ever before in the last decade, every conversion matters to your business. There are simply fewer of them to go around than there have been in recent times, and so you need to make good use of every dollar you’re investing in acquiring customers.

Updating your website, or re-platforming it to a better performing and converting one, is one of the best ways to improve conversions and make good use of your marketing dollars.

Big results come from big actions.

Looking to redesign your website? Schedule a free call with our team to learn more about the agencies on Credo who do web development services, and get connected with the right ones for free.